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patsy
Joined: 07 Oct 2004
Posts: 179
Location: china
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 Posted: Sat Feb 24, 2007 8:03 am Post subject: |
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| I remember in Beijing studying chinese , we had a teacher who wasn't very interesting, but as it is in foreign language study, being he was a chinese native speaker , I felt that I learned sufficiently from him. A lot of language learning has to do with motivation and attitude and definitely NOT the quality of the teacher. Let's be real, preparation in ESL training usually consists of teaching small groups of no more than 20 students, quite a difference from being asked to teach oral english to a classroom of 60 plus students with varying levels and No textbooks. To those who can do it effectively and naturally , more power to you. As for me, I don't care if they're all bored out of their skin and complain non stop. |
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abusalam4
Joined: 24 Feb 2007
Posts: 143
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| Posted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 10:09 pm Post subject: Really? |
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I have never experienced students resenting foreign teachers. On the contrary, all of them have always been most helpful and even more respectful than they perhaps should have been.
I am talking about state-run colleges and universities.
What schools are you talking about?
Those where the kids with a rich family background go? If so, forget them! |
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Steppenwolf
Joined: 30 Jul 2006
Posts: 1769
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| Posted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 1:40 am Post subject: Re: Really? |
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| abusalam4 wrote: |
I have never experienced students resenting foreign teachers. On the contrary, all of them have always been most helpful and even more respectful than they perhaps should have been.
I am talking about state-run colleges and universities.
What schools are you talking about?
Those where the kids with a rich family background go? If so, forget them! |
Sorry to say this is a naive and illusional statement; resentments can brew up quite quickly and stem from pretty innocuous-looking matters. There certainly are generalised prejudices against all FTs though they may not always surface; the biggest one is that students (and their own teachers) assume that FTs are incompetent.
It also is a common belief among Chinese that it's easier to pass tests and exams held by FTs, which explains why at tertiary schools so many students sign up for courses under FTs that earn them easy credits.
Actually some FTs do their best to not disappoint such students including the laziest ones! |
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englishgibson
Joined: 09 Mar 2005
Posts: 4345
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| Posted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 12:32 pm Post subject: |
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while i agree with you that many chinese students "assume" that foreign teachers are incompetent, i've got to disagree on...
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one wrote:
I have never experienced students resenting foreign teachers. On the contrary, all of them have always been most helpful and even more respectful than they perhaps should have been.
your reply:
Sorry to say this is a naive and illusional statement... |
some actually have had some really pleasant experiences with chinese students, if it is in public schools or in private ones...so, saying that one is "naive and illusional" is rather mean to one's actual experiences, in my opinion
from my experience in 2001 in Guangzhou (public s) or 2002-3 in Fuzhou (private s), students were as helpful and respectful
china is a big country with many kinds of students and experiences may vary tremendously 
peace to chinese educational system
and
cheers and beers to all chinese that want to..well have money to learn English  |
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The Voice Of Reason
Joined: 29 Jun 2004
Posts: 492
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| Posted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 1:31 pm Post subject: |
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...
Last edited by The Voice Of Reason on Sun Sep 29, 2013 7:18 am; edited 1 time in total |
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InTime
Joined: 06 Dec 2005
Posts: 1676
Location: CHINA-at-large
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| Posted: Tue Feb 27, 2007 1:48 pm Post subject: |
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RE:
kev initial Post....
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| How many FTs with no experience come into a classroom unprepared, nervous, unable to take control right away, etc.? |
This phrase
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| unable to take control |
can have two clearly different
(even mutually exclusive)
One...is immortalized/analyzed/destroyed/resurrected
in the semi-autobiographical Pink Floyd movie The Wall
The TEACHER in the film
has/is an AUTHORITARIAN Personality
Fascism-style...
He focused upon CONTROL of the students in his class
CONTROL with a Big Stick
He hits the knuckles of a future Floyd, when he discovers him writing
future Floyd successful lyrics
writing lyrics during Geometry theorems drilling
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| unable to take control |
Another is...two...
"take control" as by a captivating performing artist/poet/speaker
again...it's about ENERGY...
Can the teacher/students cultivate an energetic learning environment?
------------------------------------------------------------------------
RE: question about dark side from students...
in my experience/analysis...that question/problem generally relates to
MALE students
China's male students/white collar ITs etc... are often like taut strings
Heavy-duty SHADOW work facing these patriarchal Chinese men
I like the ALTERNATIVE...be more selective/future-focused
DEVELOP FT PROJECTS especially for China's WOMEN
WOMAN POWER!!! |
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Steppenwolf
Joined: 30 Jul 2006
Posts: 1769
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:40 am Post subject: |
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| InTime wrote: |
This phrase
| Quote: |
| unable to take control |
can have two clearly different
(even mutually exclusive)
One...is immortalized/analyzed/destroyed/resurrected
in the semi-autobiographical Pink Floyd movie The Wall
The TEACHER in the film
has/is an AUTHORITARIAN Personality
Fascism-style...
He focused upon CONTROL of the students in his class
CONTROL with a Big Stick
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I am confused by your ideologising and stigmatising efforts, InTime! You remind me of Bernard Shaw and a number of similarly-minded leftists who used to proclaim that possessing property is akin to theft! You are clearly portraying entire professions and genders as incorribly Machiavellian and wicked. How can one be an educator and cling to such primitive classwar ideas?
I am a fan of Pink Floyd and their rock opera THE WALL, in particular of the piece "We don't want no education". It's a powerful and persuasive song! Any Chinese educator should study its lyrics!
But you have gone way over the top in your sterotyping of teachers as control freaks. The ideal classroom is a venue where the education recipients voluntarily cooperate with the dispenser of education with a clear understanding what's in their own best interest. Now you may not know this but anyone however fainlty familiar with human nature knows intuitively and practically that children have strong rebellious tendencies that are sometimes directed against their peers, at other times against their siblings, at still other times against classmates or the whole school. A classroom is a place where an adult person tries to instill in younger citizens a sense of propriety, a desire of becoming "like them", i.e. adult in spite of themselves (did you want to become an adult when you were a minor?). There never is total success as some students will lag behind others, and sometimes whole classes lose traction on the ground (perhaps more often nowadays in the West than in China).
The kids attend school only because they have no alternatives; how then can a stranger impose his or her will on a bunch of school kids? There must be agreement between those who send their offspring to school and the teachers themselves on what the kids have to do during their time at school.
You with so many years of living in China to your belt ought to know better than anyone else where the concept of "controlling of minds" comes from, in whose interest nit is. I personally believe Chinese adults kill the spare time of their own kids through the endlessly repetitive and mind-dulling stomping of little feet on treadmills. No matter how lenient a teacher, his students must not be seen to slack off; parents and society at large will see to it that kids get as little if any spare time! Playing, arts and sports are viewed as wasteful.
It is therefore unbelievable that you should castigate FTs rather than the Chinese authoritarian adults!
FTs are as much victims of Chinese education fascism as the Chinese students are! And since you used the term "fascism", fascist practices can easily be applied by Chinese teachers and students against FTs! |
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TravellingAround
Joined: 12 Nov 2006
Posts: 423
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:54 am Post subject: |
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| Steppenwolf wrote: |
I am a fan of Pink Floyd and their rock opera THE WALL, in particular of the piece "We don't want no education". It's a powerful and persuasive song! Any Chinese educator should study its lyrics!
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Hate to be pedantic Step but...
The actual line is "we don't NEED no education."
Actually wait no, hang on a sec...I got that wrong.
I love being a pedant!  |
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kev7161
Joined: 06 Feb 2004
Posts: 5880
Location: Suzhou, China
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 7:07 am Post subject: |
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By "take control", I mean being a teacher who can show professionalism in the classroom, not get flustered, being prepared for lessons, not letting arrogant students walk all over you, establish fair classroom rules from the very beginning . . . and so on. I know there are probably some teachers out there who bring in their laptop computer and their guitar the first day, show some movie clips, play some songs, tell a few jokes - - I have no problem with that and maybe they'll have a fun-loving class that learns a lot and whose English improves by leaps and bounds. However, I'm more referring to those teachers who have little to no experience, don't know how to use a textbook or write a lesson plan, and let the students dictate how the class is to be run. Some of these green souls will catch on pretty quick, some will be left hanging out in the wind.
So, take control of the class from day one. Have a plan in mind, be flexible, but make sure the students know which person is the teacher in the classroom. Some of them are still going to resent you though! |
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InTime
Joined: 06 Dec 2005
Posts: 1676
Location: CHINA-at-large
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 9:06 am Post subject: |
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RE: "Take Control" and Textbooks and Lesson Plans...
Kev7161...yes...your words are quite relevant for China's FTs working within the SYSTEM...
"ARROGANT" students in the classroom...
For myself over the years, my focus/negotation/selection dynamics have been directed in having teaching positions which are ALTERNATIVES to the SYSTEM, in harmony w/principles such as BELOW, on page 1 of Promoting Change thread:
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Key Principles
*Second language acquisition occurs when
comprehensible input is delivered in a low-anxiety
situation, when real messages of real interest are
transmitted and understood.
(Krashen)
*A very interesting hypothesis is that we learn best
only when the pressure is completely off, when anxiety
is zero, when the acquirer's focus is entirely on
communication; in short, when the interchange or input
is so interesting that the acquirer 'forgets" that it
is in a second language.
(Krashen)
*It has become evident to many teachers of ESL
students that most of the available texts and
materials are based on artificial sequencing of
grammatical structures and stilted, often irrelevant,
dialogues and topics.
(Rodriguez and White) |
RE: Teachers and the Authoritarian Personality
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| Abstract: Hypotheses concerning the relationships among authoritarianism in personality, custodialism in pupil control ideology and autocracy in family ideology of elementary school educators were developed and tested. (Editor) |
When the students are not intrinsically motivated...then control/force
tend to be used as an ALTERNATIVE.
Certainly, China's Edu-SYSTEM is not unique in its tendency to Authoritarianism. In the US, Europe and throughout the world, there are ALTERNATIVE Edu-movements promoting Alternatives to Classroom Authoritarianism.
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Authoritarianism: Enslaving Yoke of Nations and Schools (EJ745182)
Author(s):
Melby, Ernest O.
Source:
Clearing House: A Journal of Educational Strategies, Issues and Ideas, v79 n5 p224-227 May-Jun 2006
Pub Date:
2006-00-00
Descriptors:
Authoritarianism; Educational Practices; Educational Policy; Consciousness Raising; Social Problems; Democracy
Abstract:
The basic principle of authoritarianism is that the masses of mankind are viewed as incapable of determining or developing their own criteria of truth and value. Accordingly, the masses cannot effectively govern themselves but must place their faith in the wisdom and the authority of the few highly selected individuals who by their very competence are fitted to comprise the ruling class. Similarly, the masses cannot effectively seek or find the truth, thus they must appeal to authority. Since they are incompetent to determine what is right, they must ask who is right. In this article the author discusses the evils of authoritarianism and how it has been practiced in today's educational system. In reality, the modern society do not really have a democratic system of education. However, many do not know of this because they do not have an idea of the real meaning of democracy. As such, it is important that today's children and youth be taught of the ideology of democracy so that they may become immune to the authoritarian propaganda in the future.
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InTime
Joined: 06 Dec 2005
Posts: 1676
Location: CHINA-at-large
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 9:46 am Post subject: |
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Steppenwolf...regarding
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| The ideal classroom is a venue where the education recipients voluntarily cooperate with the dispenser of education with a clear understanding what's in their own best interest. |
This is in the spirit of the approach called/criticized...by the terms:
*Banking Education
*Instructivism (rather than Constructivism)
RE: "human nature" and "rebellious" youngsters...there are different traditions/different perspectives, such as Spain's edu-systems under
(1)the leftist Republic
(2)the fascist Franco\
| Quote: |
The Reinvention of the New Education Movement in the Franco Dictatorship (Spain, 1936-1976) (EJ748875)
Author(s):
Andres, Maria del Mar del Pozo; Braster, J. F. A.
Source:
Paedagogica Historica: International Journal of the History of Education, v42 n1-2 p 109-126 Feb 2006
Pub Date:
2006-02-00
Pub Type(s):
Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Peer-Reviewed:
Yes
Descriptors:
Publications; Educational Change; Foreign Countries; Authoritarianism; Elementary Schools; Catholics; Educational Practices; Intellectual History; Change Agents; Politics of Education; Educational History; Activism
Abstract:
During the Second Spanish Republic (1931-1939) the Government identified many of its educational goals with those of the international movement of the New School. While not subscribing to any particular trends, the legal documents are filled with appeals to activism, vitality, work school and collaboration. Many teachers identified with and enthusiastically supported these ideas.
However, other educators, those generally belonging to Catholic Associations, saw the New School as a movement that served as an international referendum for such ideas as religious neutrality or coeducation, introduced by the Republican government in primary schools and that was perceived by these groups as an important step in the "de-Christianization" of Catholic Spain. Once the Civil War (1936-1939) was over, these same educators were commissioned to create a pedagogic body for the new Francoist legislation.
In this article the different phases of the relationship of the New School movement with the so called "new Spanish pedagogy" are analysed. In the first phase (1936-1949) the dominating characteristics were silence and rejection. Not only was the New School criticized but it was silenced and made invisible. It was even denied the name by which it was known worldwide.
Concepts defended by New School such as interest, joy and activity were compared with the concepts of effort, pain and discipline, as the truly Spanish pedagogic alternative. The explicit condemnation that the Francoist pedagogues made of Rousseauan naturalism, the latest inspiration of the New School, was hidden behind this "war of terminologies." This condemnation was in line with the ideas of the Papal Encyclical Divini Illius Magistri (1929). |
KEY Dynamics in the INTRINSIC/EXTRINSIC Dialectic
interest, joy and activity
effort, pain and discipline
For an ALTERNATIVE UTOPIAN edu-perspective, Huxley's ISLAND is valuable and based upon "human-nature" and human culture.
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Island (novel) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia- [ 翻译此页 BETA ]Island is Huxley's utopian foil to his dystopian 1930s novel Brave New World. It was the last novel before his death in 1963. ... Island explores many of the themes and ideas that interested Huxley in the Post World War II decades, ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_(novel) |
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kev7161
Joined: 06 Feb 2004
Posts: 5880
Location: Suzhou, China
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:16 am Post subject: |
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*yawn!* Wow, this thread became BORING so quickly!  |
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tw
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
Posts: 3898
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kev7161
Joined: 06 Feb 2004
Posts: 5880
Location: Suzhou, China
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 1:30 pm Post subject: |
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| okay, that's just creepy - - and he called the other guy "pervy"? I don't know how old that "author" is of course, but 18 years old? Isn't that like, what, 12 in China? *shudder!* |
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tw
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
Posts: 3898
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| Posted: Wed Feb 28, 2007 2:25 pm Post subject: |
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| Twenty-seven years old, seperated from a very young half-Asian wife in the USA. Decided to escape from the wife and came to China. Guess what? He's one of the FT's at my school. |
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